Author Archives: ct17

Some advice that I would give to incoming freshmen about research would be:

1. Don’t plagiarize! There will be severe consequences if you do.

2. Always check the authority of authors to see whether or not they are qualified to be writing about the topic you are researching on.

3. Familiarize yourself with shortcuts such as quotations, and, or that might be available on search engines like Google.

4. When reading a piece of research, always record basic citations and notes so you can save time with your work. It’s good to be organized.

5. Don’t always use the first source you see in Google, you may have to refine your search or dig deeper into the results to get a better source.

6. Peruse around the school website and if you find that your school subscribes to certain databases, use them to help with future research projects because they make things more convenient.

7. Be able to distinguish between what is a book source and what is a journal source. Each source has its own benefits and drawbacks.

8. Certain databases have field searches which help narrow down your search. It’s good to be able to understand what each field search does.

9. Sometimes current events are so recent that there are no peer reviewed journal articles written about them because those take a few months or years to write. It’s important to realize that information is published at different rates depending on the medium (i.e. Magazine article, book, journal article.)

10. Finally, learn to create APA or MLA citations in order to prevent plagiarism. Make sure that you know which one your teacher is asking for because each citation is styled differently.

boyd, danah , and Nicole B. Ellison. “Social Network Sites: Definition, History, and Scholarship.” Journal of Computer-Mediated Communication. 13.1 (2007): 210-230. Web. 29. Nov. 2010.

Facebook. “Privacy Policy | Facebook.” Welcome to Facebook. Facebook, 5 Oct. 2010. Web. 29 Nov. 2010.

Lessig, Lawrence. Free Culture: How Big Media Uses Technology and the Law to Lock Down Culture and Control Creativity. New York: Penguin Press, 2004. Print.

Sisario, Ben. “U.S. Shuts Down Web Sites in Piracy Crackdown.” The New York times 26 Nov. 2010: 1. Web. 29 Nov. 2010.

Yardi, Sarita, and Danah Boyd. “Dynamic Debates: An Analysis of Group Polarization Over Time on Twitter.” Bulletin of Science, Technology & Society 30.5 (2010): 316-327. Academic Search Complete. EBSCO. Web. 29 Nov. 2010.

The New York World’s Fair, 1939-40 – Treasures of The New York Public Library. 01 Oct. 2008. Youtube. Web. 29 Nov. 2010.

Background: Griggs, 2009

Exhibits: Burroughs & Eby, 1998

Argument: Wellman et al., 2003

Method: Strauss & Corbin, 1998

1. I think that one of the three important things I learned today in class was how to utilize another database to help me with future research. I think that Web of Science is a great database to use if I want to find other articles that might pertain to a subject that I am researching in. Another important thing is that this helps narrow down my searches significantly by placing all the articles that have cited the original article which I was looking for. This was a common technique that I used when I had my Social Science Research class and having a database that compiles all the cited works helps even more with my research. The last thing that I learned today is how Google Scholar’s cited list isn’t always completely accurate and this was because I was never exposed to the Web of Science database before so I had no other tool to find other citations with but now that I do, I’ll probably use Google Scholar a lot less.

2. I don’t think there’s anything that I’m really uncertain about when dealing with evaluating sources but I think that sometimes, even if you don’t have a degree in a certain subject area, your thoughts and ideas can be as highly valued as the person who does. Although I do understand that sometimes it’s better to trust sources who do have degrees in the area, I just don’t think they should be valued any less.

When browsing through the subject headings for information technology, I noticed that it seemed to be separated based on country sometimes (if it was available) and then it would place a subtopic which would be how information technology affects it. For example, “Information technology – Environmental aspects” would contain books that talk about information technology in regards to the environment and how it affects our surroundings. Sometimes the subject headings would go further and then specify how information technology affects something like the economy in a certain country, like India. The subject heading helps narrow down your search into something more organized.